I’ve applied for jobs a few times and this has always been a problem. Now that I’ve been out of college for a while it’s even more of a problem. I don’t have anyone from college that would even remember me. I can’t use my current coworkers because I don’t want my current employer to know I’m leaving until I have a new job lined up. I don’t keep in touch with old coworkers. I don’t do anything outside of work as far as volunteering or anything. I know I’m not supposed to use friends or family. Who is even left after that? The only people I have the contact info for are friends, family, and my current boss.
I work for a fairly big university and we still ask (or at least we did pre-COVID, when I handled some recruitment stuff). And it has to be, like… two references from two different positions (or classes or whatever)? Again, unless something changed.
References are hard as shit to get ahold of, too. I could pay off all my debts if I had a nickel for every time I had to get recruitment to nab us more refs.
Schools seem to have weird requirements. I work in broadcast engineering and applied for a bunch of jobs lately and the only one that required references was one at a community college. And not only that but they also required I give them two phone numbers on the application. Who has more than one phone number these days unless your work happens to provide you with a phone?
???
Did they not accept email references or something? What a weird way of doing it.